Eternity's Wheel (12 page)

She looked back down at me, her face less than a foot away from mine and those spider-leg wings stretching out and over us both. “I learned how to feel your fire, little Walkersssss. . . .” She trailed off into a hiss, twitching once or twice, and suddenly turned her head to the side. She popped some of the vertebrae in her neck with a sound like cracking knuckles, one that set my teeth on edge. “And how,” she
continued, “to sssssssuck it all up . . .”

She smiled at me, a perfect, beautiful, human smile, except for the fact that I could see through her face. “Flames,” she muttered. “Such beautiful flames. Beautiful butterflies. Mother Moth has all she needs, now.”

It became obvious right then, as it really should have been before, that she was completely mad. Whatever had happened to her—if I'd gotten the powder from the rendering room, had it been part of the process used to boil us down to our essences? Is that what I'd somehow done?—it had clearly stolen her sanity. Although, that could have been attributed solely to being trapped in the Nowhere-at-All for a few years. . . .

“What do you mean, all you need?” I asked, but she wasn't looking at me anymore. “Indigo!” I shouted, and that got her attention.

She moved suddenly, all the points of her bone wing-legs digging into my sides. She was on top of me, hovering over me, and I could feel our skin touching. Hers felt slick and rubbery, and I tried to shrink back, but there was nowhere to go.

“You will address me as
Lady
,” she hissed, right in my face. “I remember a time when you would have done anything I asked, little Harker, and I can make that time come again.”

“Try it,” I spat, though in truth I was terrified of her enchanting me again. The last time she'd cast a spell on me,
I would have walked happily off a cliff if she'd asked me to. I couldn't bear the thought of being under that kind of control again, but I wasn't about to let
her
know that.

“And so I shall, wildfire,” she murmured, her lips close to my ear. “I'm going to eat all your friends and then make you
love me for it
.”

I opened my mouth, but all that came out was a shocked, strangled sound. I was furious, and terrified. I had to do something. There
had
to be something I could do, but I couldn't Walk and I had no equipment on me, nothing to help me out of this web thing.

“I'll go with you,” I said desperately. “Take me wherever you want, just—”

“Let them go? Such a noble Harker,” she said, pushing against me and the web. She floated backward, the bone legs that had been digging into my sides arcing up behind her, looking more like wings again. “A valiant hero, defeating the evil sorceress, leaving her to wither and fester in the dark . . . Which little light should I drink from first?”

She was hovering about three feet from me now, impressive and terrible as she lifted a hand to point at me. “Duck,” she said, and I was further confused. Then she smiled, pointing to my left. “Duck . . .”

She moved her hand farther, pointing at someone else I couldn't see. She stayed in front of me, so I could see her expression as she chose who was to die next. “Duck . . .”

Then, with no warning whatsoever, I couldn't quite see her anymore. Someone was blocking my view, their back to me, but I recognized the ratty backpack she wore. Josephine. She was suddenly
there
, between me and Lady Indigo, and then I heard a loud
crack
as she fired her .45.

Now, InterWorld didn't tend to use standard guns for two reasons. Mostly because we had access to things far more advanced, like plasma blasters. The other reason was most agents of Binary and HEX either were immune to pesky things like bullets or had ways of getting around them, like skin shields or magic. I wouldn't have expected a standard gun to do much damage to something that looked like
that
.

A short, startled scream ripped through the air, but this time it was Lady Indigo. Bullets, it seemed, would work.

Crack
. The gun fired again, and Lady Indigo recoiled. Then another figure appeared, in a shimmer of violet light that made my heart leap into my throat. “Acacia!” I yelled, and then I got a haphazard impression of familiar violet eyes set in an unfamiliar face, and a glare that would wither stone. It wasn't Acacia. It was a boy about my age, wielding a katana-style sword that sported a blade of something other than steel, maybe jade. He raised the weapon over his head, facing me, and I had another instant to realize it was patterned gold and green, like a circuit board. Like Acacia's fingernails.

Then he struck, slicing the circuitry blade down toward
me. Despite the fact that this seemed like a rescue, I couldn't help a surge of adrenaline as he brought the weapon down. He was cutting it
close—

I felt a sudden sting against my ear, but the web fell away behind me. I grabbed at the remaining bits of it, remembering that the Nowhere-at-All had its own gravity, and I could fall if I wasn't careful.

This new person who wasn't Acacia didn't seem to be having that problem; he cut me free of the web, then sped away toward the other ones. It was like he was gliding on nothing, skating on air. I remembered Acacia doing the same thing once, in the In-Between.

Crack
. Josephine was still firing. I turned to look; she seemed to be standing on nothing, Hue hovering next to her. A second later I realized she was standing on a grav-board. I had no idea where she might have gotten it, or where she'd been for the past few minutes, not that it was important right now; she was still shooting, and I'd counted at least three shots. Those plus the one she'd fired at Hue meant she was at least halfway to empty on a standard .45, and Lady Indigo was still moving.

“Joey!” Joeb was free now, too, also clinging to his web. I turned to face him, seeing what was behind me for the first time. I'd been right in my estimation; we'd been suspended in separate webs, in a giant circle, facing outward.

“Get everyone out of here!” I yelled. “Walk!”

“Where?” he shouted back, as two more shots rang out and Lady Indigo let out a high-pitched sound that was half wail, half hiss.

“Anywhere, just Walk! I'll find—”

“Stay,” the boy with the circuitry sword commanded, his voice carrying easily over the commotion. “I'll take you!” He was gathering up the threads of white light that had made up the spiderwebs, somehow weaving them together and drawing us all inward. I hadn't noticed it until now, but I was moving. The spiderweb I was clutching was being drawn into the center, with all the others. I was moving farther away from Josephine and Lady Indigo.

Click
went Josephine's .45, and she shoved it back into her makeshift holster as Lady Indigo lunged for her. One of Lady Indigo's skeletal wings drooped slightly to one side, though she was still flying; she swooped down toward Josephine, who kicked off with her grav-board, the two beginning a grotesque aerial dance as Lady Indigo attacked and Josephine dodged. I hadn't had any disks to train her with back at InterWorld Beta, but she seemed to have gotten the hang of it. I recalled the older kid next door when I was growing up; he'd given me some skateboard training before I'd skinned both elbows and lost interest. Maybe Josephine had been better at it than I had. She certainly looked like she knew what she was doing, weaving in and out of the webs still hanging in the air and expertly avoiding Lady Indigo's attacks. They
were spiraling higher and higher, farther from the webs as the mysterious newcomer drew us all closer together.

Josephine zipped closer to me, banking a hard left on the grav-board and moving back the way she'd come. Hue was still hovering around her, alternating various colors of distress. Lady Indigo whipped out a wing, the bone striking Josephine directly in the torso. She doubled over, the grav-board flying out from under her as she started to fall back down toward us.

“Hue!” I yelled. “Get the disk!”

My little mudluff friend didn't even hesitate. He sped toward the grav-board, not slowing as he approached it, and completely enveloped it in his body. Then he vanished, reappearing next to me faster than I could even blink. Above us, Lady Indigo was wheeling around, folding her wings down as though to dive.

“Harker,
stay
!” a command rang out, the unfamiliar voice of the stranger who claimed the ability to save us. I ignored him.

I leaped off the web, knees bending as I landed on the grav-board. I kicked it into gear, my body suddenly feeling twice as heavy as I surged upward. I heard the unfamiliar voice again, calling out, “
Harker!
I
will
leave you behind!” as the light around me changed, taking on a purplish hue.

Fine,
I thought,
but I'm not leaving her
. I could see Josephine a few yards above me, spread-eagled to slow her fall. If I could
get to her before Lady Indigo did—

Time seemed to slow like that; Josephine falling toward me, Lady Indigo right behind her, skeletal wings folded back to minimize resistance. Josephine tucked her arms and legs in close to her body in an attempt to fall faster. I reached for her.

She was backlit by a flash of light, bright red and soundless, like the explosion of a small star. The force propelled her forward, her head snapping back awkwardly at the sudden motion. Then my arms were around her, and I pushed off the grav-board, jumping backward, flying (falling?) back to our comrades. Lady Indigo was nowhere to be seen, and that familiar purple light was seeping in around the edges of my vision. As we fell closer and closer to it, I heard that voice again, screaming, “
Leave her!
”

I held Josephine tighter, falling into the light. She was limp as a rag doll in my arms.

I
HIT THE GROUND
hard, on my back, my arms still wrapped around Josephine, cradling her protectively against my chest. The air left my lungs, stars exploding in the corners of my vision—but I could still make out the tip of that circuitry-bladed sword as it was leveled at my face.

“I told you to leave her,” the boy who wasn't Acacia snapped. All I could do was glare, half turned to protect Josephine with my body.

“We don't leave our own behind,” Joeb said calmly, coming up to put a hand on the boy's shoulder. “Please, explain yourself.”

The boy shrugged Joeb's hand off, which gave me the opportunity to scoot back from the tip of his blade. I leaned up against a wall, registering dimly that we were back at InterWorld Beta. There were more than a few of us in the room right now, but at the moment, I only cared about one.

“Josephine,” I murmured, propping her head against my shoulder and touching her cheek. She didn't respond, though her eyes were open. I felt my breath catch, fear clutching at my stomach. This wasn't happening.

“I'm Avery Jones, Agent of TimeWatch,” the boy answered, and I slowly looked up. “And if you don't leave your own behind, explain why my people had to find and fix
him
.”

He gestured with the hand that wasn't holding the sword, and at first I had no idea what he was indicating. There were several of my team members standing there, as they had been when we'd arrived. Jo's white angel wings, some of them still wrapped firmly with bandages, stood out starkly against the gray-silver walls. Next to her was Josef, who also stood out due to his massive size. J'r'ohoho was on the floor before them, not moving, and kneeling next to him was a Walker who looked almost exactly like me, tears on his face as he gripped the centaur's shoulder.

“J/O,” I breathed, a jolt going through me. The last time I'd seen J/O, he'd been trying to kill me. Now he was crying, head bowed over J'r'ohoho's body.

“We found him wandering through the timestream,” Avery accused. “Who left him there, exactly?”

“I had no choice,” I snapped, recalling vividly the feeling of Acacia's hand on my shoulder, the way all the strength left my body as she took me through time against my will. “Acacia—”

I got no further. He took two steps forward before I could react, the tip of his sword pressing against my lower lip. The blade was warm against my skin.

“Say her name again, and see what happens,” he said, his voice low and angry.

I should have stayed still. I should have pulled back slowly and answered calmly, and I knew it. Instead, I was on my feet almost before I knew what I intended to do, batting the sword away and closing the distance between us. My hand found the material of his vest, and I hauled him closer to me.

“Whatever she may be to you,
Acacia
,” I said deliberately, “is also a friend of
mine
.”

His eyes, which were violet like hers, flashed green for a second. Whatever that meant or whatever he'd been about to do, I never found out. Joeb pulled us apart, fixing me with a stern, hard look. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw J/O get to his feet, wiping the tears from his face.

“I'm sorry, Joey,” he said, one of the few times I'd ever heard him apologize to me. “I was completely reprogrammed. I didn't . . . I wouldn't have . . .”

“I know,” I said, still glaring at Avery. “I know you wouldn't have. You okay now?”

“Yes. Fully operational. TimeWatch found me and cleaned out the virus.”

“You're welcome,” Avery said snidely. I fought the urge to throw a punch, Joeb's hand against my chest providing a
comforting measure of stability. “If that's settled, I suggest you figure out what to do with her.” He gestured over my shoulder, and I bristled.

“She's one of
us
, and not your concern.”

“Not
her
,” he said, not even sparing a glance past me to where Josephine lay. “The Agent of HEX.”

“What are you talking about?” Joeb asked, still trying to keep the peace.

“You didn't think it odd that she allowed your escape so easily?”

“That was
easy
?”

“Compared to what one of her power is capable of, yes. Did she not take out several of your number before I came to your rescue?”

We glared at each other, my anger struggling with what little common sense I was holding on to. One thought made itself known amid the fury I was fighting to keep under control.

“You knew that was going to happen,” I said.

“Of course I did,” he responded, and I very nearly went for him again.

“Why didn't you stop it?” I yelled, pressing against Joeb's hand on my shoulder.

“I'm a Time Agent, Joseph Harker, I have bigger problems. It's not
my
job to police the Altiverse. It's
yours
, and it's a job you're not going to be able to do at all if you don't stop
being an idiot and
listen
,” he snapped. “You think you know best? You think you made a clean getaway, even though I told you to leave her?”

“Joe,” came a whisper from behind me, and I forgot all about Avery Jones and TimeWatch as I went immediately to kneel by Josephine's side. “He's right,” she breathed, a mere hint of a sound, so faint I had to put my ear right down to her lips. “She's with me. I can hear her singing in my head. . . .”

“We'll fix it,” I assured her, but she made a small sound of negation.

“Can't. I know what she did . . . what happened to the others. I know what she knows. I know she's coming here.”

“She can't come through time—no one but the Time Agents and Hue can!” I looked back to Avery for confirmation, but he was shaking his head.

“Weren't you listening to a thing she said? She knows how to sense you, and how to drain you. That's how she killed the others.” Avery gestured behind him, to J'r'ohoho and the other Walkers lying too still on the cool metal floor. “She stole away their lives, and that's—”

“What she's doing to me,” Josephine whispered. “I can feel it. I can feel the others. . . .”

I stared at her, at a loss. All I could think of was that house I hadn't grown up in, the one with the portrait of the redheaded, freckle-faced girl and the woman with the prosthetic arm whose daughter would never come home. Avery
was saying something else, but I only tuned back in to one specific part.

“. . . is how she'll track her through time. She's created a soul link, and that means she can follow it anywhere, even here.” Something tugged at my memory, but Josephine twitched beside me, her hand tightening in mine.

“Avery's right,” she said, and out of the corner of my eye I saw him turn toward us. “You can't let her, Joe. He's right. She's coming here. You have to fly. Fly away.”

“We can't fly yet, Josephine,” I whispered. “You know that. We don't have power.”

She looked past me. A smile tilted up the corners of her mouth, barely. “I have power,” she said.

I felt another jolt of adrenaline break out a cold sweat all over my body. “No,” I said, putting as much force as I could into it without growling at her.

“You told me . . . You said they use us to power their ships.”

I pulled back from her, feeling like I'd been punched. “No way,” I managed. I felt sick. “I am not . . . I won't . . . !” I faltered, unable to even find the words I needed. She wanted me to use her to power the ship, like HEX and Binary used us? She didn't understand what she was asking me. She hadn't seen what I'd seen.

She was my first ever recruit. I couldn't lose her.

“I want to,” she insisted, her voice stronger than it had been a moment ago. “I want to see InterWorld fly.”

“The idea has merit,” Avery said from behind me, and even Joeb looked like he might be considering letting me hit Avery.

“You don't understand,” Joeb began, but Avery shook his head.

“Like hell I don't. I know exactly what she's asking you to do, and I'm telling you, it's not a bad idea.”

“You're insane!” I shouted, getting back to my feet. “You want me to use her like HEX does, then? Boil her down to nothing, keep her in a jar? We don't have a cryochamber here to freeze her like Binary does, but I'm sure we can build one! Hell, we'll install it next to the showers, put it to everyday use!”

“Joey,” Joeb murmured, but I ignored him.

“I won't use one of my own like that, no matter what TimeWatch says.”

I expected Avery to get mad, but he just calmly put away his sword, little flashes of electricity sparking blue as it slid into the metal sheath. “This is not a directive from TimeWatch.”

“Even if it was, TimeWatch can kiss my—”

“Joey!” Joeb was looking at me seriously, arms folded across his chest. He raised an eyebrow, glancing back down
to Josephine, who was breathing shallowly, gaze fixed on us.

Everyone else was watching me, too, Jo with her white wings folded around herself in comfort, Josef with tears on his face. Jakon's furry ears were cocked back uncertainly, her expression sad. I turned my back on all of them, glaring at Joeb.

“I
won't
,” I said.

“I would,” said Jo, from behind me. “If I had a choice. If I was dying, and I could be part of InterWorld forever . . . I would.”

“So would I,” Josef rumbled.

“I'd donate my circuits and power core,” J/O admitted. “I wouldn't be using them, and I'd give anything to keep InterWorld up and running.”

More voices spoke up from around me, adding their general agreement. Not everyone spoke up, but no one said they disagreed. Not one of them.

“You have mere minutes, Harker,” Avery said, though he was looking at Josephine rather than me. “The HEX witch will find her way here unless you act.”

“Wouldn't . . . wouldn't binding her to the ship keep that link?” I asked, grasping desperately at straws. “Wouldn't Lady Indigo be able to track us, then?”

“I can break the link,” Avery said.

“Then why don't you? Just—”

“Because breaking it will kill her,” he snapped. “And
despite what you think of me, I am unwilling to do so without her permission.”

The room was holding its breath. Everyone was watching me as I stood there in silence, staring at the floor. I had no idea why, but I suddenly remembered when I'd first come to InterWorld with Jay's body. I'd woken up in the infirmary and seen Jay's funeral from the window, and after that the Old Man had come in to see me. He'd talked to me about InterWorld and our purpose and our enemies and our duties. He'd talked about our oath and our values and he'd told me when my classes started, but that wasn't what I found myself remembering. It was when I'd asked if he blamed me for Jay's death.

Yes,
he'd said.
Of course I do
.

“J/O,” I said, and the cyborg version of me looked up. “Can one of the PLSS units in the infirmary be modified to hook up to a transducer?”

“I think so,” he said.

“Figure it out, fast. Josef, go get one and bring it to the engine room.” I didn't even have to look to know the huge version of me was doing as told. I could feel his footsteps
thump
,
thump
,
thump
down the hall as he left, like a heartbeat.

Josephine looked up at me from where she was propped up weakly against the wall. “I want to do this,” she whispered.

Joeb and Avery walked behind me as I carried Josephine
down the hall to the engine room, ignoring the pain in my injured shoulder. I could hear everyone else following, the footsteps of thirty or so of me echoing in the dead ship.

I don't remember much from the moment the decision was made to when I saw Josef bring in the PLSS—one of the portable life support systems we kept in the infirmary. I know at some point I'd sent a few others to get a cot, which was what Josephine was currently laid out upon next to the machines. She was paler than we usually were, her freckles standing out starkly against her skin. I imagined I was beginning to see the bones beneath, like Lady Indigo's translucent skin. She was sweating and she kept telling us to hurry up so we could get this over with.

Once we'd gotten her set up on the cot, Avery had knelt next to her. He hadn't moved since, and she was smiling faintly as they spoke in low tones. He was holding her hand. It seemed odd—hadn't they just met?—but I had other things to worry about right now.

“That should do it,” J/O said, his voice subdued as he stepped back from the machinery. “The PLSS is hooked up to the solar power grid, so it'll run. Theoretically, if she . . . when she . . .”

“Dies,” I said. The younger version of me blanched.

“When that happens while she's hooked up to the PLSS, it'll store an imprint of her and autopulse to act as
a defibrillator. I have the pulse wired into the transducer instead.”